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RSTB Best of 2017
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RSTB Best of 2018
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RSTB Best of 2016
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RSTB Best of 2019
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Best of 2019 (so far)
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RSTB Most Overlooked
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Ethan Miller – Inspirations for Alligator Bride
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RSTB Best of 2017 (so far)
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Jeffrey Alexander on Keith Jarrett’s – Restoration Ruin

by on ·Bits & Pieces, Features

Among the artists that dominated RSTB last year, Jeffrey Alexander was one of the most prolific, showing up with Dire Wolves (in one of their best yet), on a solo jaunt for Feeding Tube, and playing the RSTB anniversary show with a new group dubbed The Heavy Lidders. The latter featured members of Elkhorn and Bardo Pond laying waste to the blues in fine fashion. In anticipatetion for Dire Wolves’ latest album, on the way next month from Centripetal Force, Jeffrey’s contributed a pick to the Hidden Gems series. Picking out an oddity in the typically jazz-centric catalog of Keith Jarrett, he sheds some new light on an often maligned piece of the artist’s repertoire. Check out how this record came into Alexander’s life and what makes it such a treasure.

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Elkhorn’s Jesse Sheppard on Bruce Palmer’s – The Cycle Is Complete

by on ·Bits & Pieces, Features

One of my top picks from last year was, without hesitation, the double LP darkness and light journey of Elkhorn. The double dose of lysergically locked guitars on Elk Jam and Sun Cycle pushed the band beyond anything in their catalog and sets up some pretty high expectations for their upcoming shut-in brainstorm The Storm Sessions. I’ve gotten to run a few shows over the past year with the band’s Jesse Sheppard on the bill and know that he’s not only a consummate musican but also a devoted collector. Naturally I figured he’d be a great fit for the Hidden Gems series and, as such, he has shed some much-needed light on a Buffalo Springfield-adjacent obscurity that sent a bit of a middle finger to the record industry on its release. Check out Jesse discussing Bruce Palmer’s The Cycle is Complete below.

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RSTB Best of 2019

by on ·Bits & Pieces, Features

2019’s drawing to a close, so I suppose this is the place to tie it all up. I’ve mentioned in years past that ‘best’ is a hard line to draw around the music from the year. From a blog perspective ‘favorite’ seems more appropriate, but then for all intents and purposes my choices are qualitatively the best to me, if not necessarily quantitatively best in the sense of the zeitgeist. The drive to figure out what’s best seems to just consolidate consensus and we’re all treated to dozens of lists that cross over with each other, especially in the top spots. I’ve long been a proponent of niche. I say long live finding your voice and letting others find theirs – we can all compare notes and discover new music in the process. I don’t need anyone to sand the edges and offer up a list that’s all inclusive. I like the edges. These are my favorites from a great year, edges and all.

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Hurt Valley’s Brian Collins on Tara Jane O’Neil – Peregrine

by on ·Bits & Pieces, Features

Any new Woodsist signing is cause for inquiry, but the debut from Hurt Valley is an amber-hued slice of Cosmic Americana that’s ticking a lot of boxes over here. The album channels the windswept, sea salt sanded vision of West Coast country-psych that permeated the best private press issues. He’s finding common ground with everyone from Jim Sullivan to Rose City Band and I couldn’t be happier to have Brian contribute a pick to the Hidden Gems series. Check out the story by hind how Tara Jane Oneil’s excellent debut became an illicit part of his record collection.

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Charles Rumback on Houndog – S/T

by on ·Bits & Pieces, Features

The new collaboration between Ryley Walker and Charles Rumback is a highlight for both artists, but while you might be more familiar with Walker’s extensive output, there’s plenty to dig into with his foil’s career as well. The Chicago percussionist has worked with Jazz trio Colorist alongside John Hughes and Charles Gorczynski and found contemporaries in Fred Lonberg-Holm and Nick Macri in Stirrup. He’s touched through experimental country with The Horses Ha and led his own records exploring jazz under his own name. Rumback’s been a lynchpin in the Chicago scene for over fifteen years and so I asked him to drop in a pick to the Gems series. Interestingly he’s also chosen a collaboration, the late ‘90s team-up of Mike Halby from Canned Heat and David Hidalgo from Los Lobos under the name Houndog. Check out how this came into Charles’ life and the impact it’s had on him.

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Andy Cabic on Jane Getz – “No Ordinary Child”

by on ·Bits & Pieces, Features

Andy Cabic’s been a mainstay here at RSTB and his latest LP captures a new dose of mountain air in his sails. As I mentioned last week in my review, “Themes of wanderlust, lost love and new beginnings have (rightly) earned the album comparisons to Tom Petty’s mid-life high water mark Wildflowers. Shades of R.E.M. jangle up and there’s a rootsy honesty that knocks at Crazy Horse’s door.” It’s one of Cabic’s most unfussed, and yet one of his most affecting works. The Gems column always offers a chance to look behind the curtain on what an artist finds dear and Cabic shines a proper light on a country treasure that’s certainly in line with the amber hues and cool breezes thrumming through the wires of his own recent songwriting. Check out Andy’s take on an early ’70s forgotten treasure from Jane Getz below.

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Kayla Cohen of Itasca on The Groundhogs – Solid

by on ·Bits & Pieces, Features

The new record from Kayla Cohen’s Itasca is full of crisp mountain air and rivulets of gorgeous folk guitar. Its the culmination of her many years as an artist welling her writing into a soft breeze of folk that places her in ranks with Linda Perhacs, Vashti Bunyan, and Jackson C. Frank. The record is full of isolation and loneliness, an absolute treasure of meditative bliss. Naturally I was curious to see what Cohen might pick as a hidden gem, delving back into her own influences. She went not towards the delicate side, or into the garden of fingerpicked folk, but to a source of power from T.S. McPhee and company’s later years as The Groundhogs. Check out how Kayla found Solid and what effect it’s had on her own works over the years.

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Prana Crafter’s Will Sol on Terry Riley, Don Cherry, Karl Berger ‎– Live In Köln 23.2.1975

by on ·Bits & Pieces, Features

Last year Prana Crafter’s Will Sol released two vital parch-folk LPs for Beyond Beyond is Beyond and Sunrise Ocean Bender, both showcasing his mossy, forest-folk prowess mixed with a tenancy to scratch that wooded habit with the key to the cosmos. He’s pushed the cosmic tendencies even further this year with a split with Tarotplane that uses one side of a 12” to wind his folk into kosmiche delights. It seemed only natural, then to ask Will to contribute a pick to the Hidden Gems series and see what’s driven his sound. Will’s picked a ’75 collaboration from Terry Riley and Don Cherry that picks at a peirod that pushed both artists catalogs to in new and interesting directions. Check out how this came into Will’s live and what impact it’s had on his music.

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Anton Newcombe on PIL – Second Edition

by on ·Bits & Pieces, Features

The Hidden Gems feature continues to bring out some of the best recommendations, and this time another legend walks through the pages of the piece. Ahead of the debut LP from L’epée, his new collaboration with The Limiñanas and French songwriter Emmaunelle Seigner of Ultra Orange, Brian Jonestown Massacre frontman Anton Newcombe throws a recommendation into the ring for Gems. It should be no surprise that Newcombe’s got a shelf-full of punk and psych classics to cull from and he gives puts a solid stamp on the US edition of Public Image Ltd.’s Metal Box given the less pricey package and name Second Edition over here. Its taken as a given now that the album is a post-punk canon staple, easily accessible for punk youths looking to expand their soundscapes these days, but keep in mind that Newcombe stumbled into the record on original release in 1980, when word of mouth, record counter recommendations were the best inroads and import prices made purchases more selective. Find out how this one came into Newcombe’s orbit below.

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